“The crafty tone,” she said. “I’m the crafty one, you’re the likable one.”
“You’re likable. I like you a lot.” He winked at her, setting a fluttery feeling stirring in the places where she already ached. “Now tell me why you quit. You don’t seem like a quitter.”
She glanced back at the trail. “I told myself I quit because people didn’t know what to do with the kind of songs I was writing—Chicano-country fusion stuff that reminded me of why I fell in love with music—but lately I’ve been thinking…” She shrugged uncomfortably. “It didn’t have to end there. I could have changed things up. I could have tried a different style, joined a group, or found some other way to stay in front of the microphone.”
“So why didn’t you?” he prodded after she was silent for a long moment.
“I think I was scared to succeed,” she said, pulse picking up as she finally said the words out loud, words she’d barely let whisper between her own ears let alone dared to bring out into the open. “My whole life I’d been so determined to prove everyone wrong—my parents, my brothers, and everyone else who said my dreams were ridiculous. But the closer I got to making it…”
She took a deep breath, tilting her head back to gaze up at the thick gray clouds. “I don’t know. I guess I started to worry that if I got big enough for the world to notice me, it would confirm what all the naysayers had been saying all along. And by that time I really didn’t have anything left but the music. I didn’t know who I’d be if that was judged and found lacking.
“Then, there was this one month…” she continued with a sigh. “I got a horrible review in ATX, followed by three brutal rejections on my demo tape and I just…backed away. I stopped booking new gigs, and started apprenticing with my old manager. Before long, I was relieved to be behind the scenes, where I was safe from failure and success and everything else that comes along with fighting to make a dream come true.”
“Was it worth it?” he asked, guiding Cricket closer to Darcy, close enough that he could reach out and give her thigh a squeeze.
“I love the clients I’ve helped, and I love working with you, but….” She looked over at him, heart beating faster. “I’m starting to think some dreams are worth the risks, no matter how scary.”
A light came into his tired eyes. “You aren’t just talking about singing, are you?”
She shook her head, smiling as he leaned over, standing up in his stirrups to press a kiss to her lips as Cricket snorted in disapproval.
“You’re going to get thrown,” she said, laughing against his warm mouth.
“Worth it.” He settled back into his saddle. “Thank you for telling me. That wasn’t so bad, was it?”
She grudgingly lifted one shoulder. “I’ve been through worse. I guess I could get used to the personal sharing thing.”
“You’re cute when you’re pretending to be cranky,” he said, laughing when she stuck out her tongue in his direction. “You want to stop and eat lunch?”
She frowned. “We just ate breakfast. And you had four biscuits.”
“I know, but having sex all night makes me hungry,” he said, shooting her a heated look beneath the brim of his hat. “I was thinking we could maybe work in a quickie while we were at it.”
“Tempting,” Marisol said, knowing she would have raced him to see who could get their clothes off fastest if she weren’t dying to get out of Lonesome Point. “But I’d rather get these cattle back to the pens, get on the road, and have our quickie in a hotel room with a bed before we start working through our to-do list.”
“You’re right,” Robert said with a sigh. “I wasn’t worried until you started worrying, but I was awake for an hour in the middle of the night last night thinking of all the things I need to do to get ready to go. I need to call my boss at the electric company, and I should probably see if Tulsi and Clem want to move into the house while I’m gone. No sense in it sitting empty, and I know Tulsi’s been hoping to move out of her parents’ place once she saved up enough money.”
Marisol smiled. “Your friends are lucky to have you.”
“I’m lucky to have them.” Robert’s tone said that he meant every word. “Tulsi would stay on the phone and listen to me moan for hours after I broke up with Casey. Mia told me to stuff a sock in it after a few weeks, but Tulsi was there as long as I needed her, even when she was busy with work and school and the baby.”
“I love Clem.” Marisol laughed. “She’s a character. I can’t wait to play poker with her.”
Robert watched her for a moment, an unspoken question in his eyes.
“What?” she asked, dividing her attention between him and the trail as it opened up around a curve and another stunning valley view spread out before them.
The view near the house was of softly rolling hills that dropped off into flatlands on the way into town, but this valley was bisected by the sharp crease of a canyon, where Cole had been certain the cows must have been trapped. He hadn’t found any sign of them in the gullies, however, so Marisol and Robert planned to go around the canyon to the very back of the property, where the ten-thousand-acre Lawson Ranch gave way to government land, and see if the cows were lost back there.
“What,” she repeated when Robert stayed quiet. “Don’t be shy.”
He grunted. “I’m not shy. I’m cautious. I don’t want to spook you.”
“I’m not a horse,” she said, flipping her ponytail over her shoulder. “I don’tspook. I just have some questions I don’t mind answering, and some I do. You won’t know which is which until you ask.”
“Okay then…what about kids,” he said, sending her brows floating up her forehead.
“Kids,” she repeated dumbly, not knowing what else to say.